"Boy today but he was

a girl yesterday," a mother told me yesterday with a sigh. She was watching her three year old swinging on a piece of playground equipment. I had just rescued a ball thrown into the road by another child.

I must have looked as confused as I felt because she went on, "You know this gender thing. You have to ask them whether they are boys or girls now. They started it at his childcare place last year. I think it's wrong but they say we have to do it."

I suspect this mother is confused about the actual policy but the real question has to be whether it should be a policy at all. Do three year old children really understand the concept of "gender" and, more especially, whether they are "boy" or "girl", "male" or "female" or something else? 

It was so simple when I was a kitten. You were a "boy" or a "girl". It was not something anyone questioned. It was just a fact. Before you went to school you were told this. Nobody questioned it. Adults could tell bcause, most of the time, girls wore clothing intended for girls and boys wore clothing intended for boys. Girls might have their hair in plaits and boys might have one of the very new and daring "crew cut" cuts. You could see differences. 

Did we play differently? Perhaps. We were often given what were considered to be gender appropriate presents. It did not prevent us from being given other toys. I had my adored train set. My "big friend", a girl of about six or seven, had a set of tools. Her father was a "linesman" employed by the power company. Other children had other toys. Some toys were passed down and shared around as we "grew out of them". I don't think we thought of our play things as being only suited to boys or girls. They might be put to a different purpose but we did not restrict their use to the supposedly appropriate gender. 

I have no idea when I understood there was a difference between "boy" and "girl" but it was certainly something I would have known when my brother was born. I would have been two years old. Did I really understand at the time? I doubt it. I simply knew there was a difference between us. Asking me whether I was a boy or a girl would not even have been an appropriate question.

I do not see it as an appropriate question now. I do not believe a four year old really understands what it means to be a "girl" or a "boy". It is highly unlikely they have such a deep understanding of the issue they feel an overwhelming desire to be something other than what they are.

I know people with strong views on the issue will see this differently. They may even want to say I am wrong. Although there are tools like "Gender Identity Questionnaires" there are no psychological tools for testing actual "gender". Even GIQs have not been extensively used, tested, validated or generally been rigorously researched. It seems all this is still highly subjective.

In the hands of an adult, particulary a skilled adult, a child can easily be influenced by leading questions. Asking a child "are you a boy or a girl?" is to sew doubt in a child's mind and I cannot help asking, "Is this really appropriate?"